Human beings are social animals, and when interacting with one another, they learn new ideas and skills and acquire knowledge and practices from other people within their environment. Emergence and development of media have enabled people, groups, organizations, and countries to interact effectively and efficiently. The aspect of interaction through media has transformed the world into a global village where people from different parts of the world, with different cultural orientations, exchange norms, beliefs, values, and practices (Fardouly & Vertanian, 2016). Media has encouraged people to the copy behaviors from other people whom they interact with. Materials that individuals see in media affects their mental processes, which sometimes affects their well-being and mental health. Media has influenced the way people think, talk, and dress. The positive impact of media on culture is that it has minimized culture shock, especially among people desiring to travel to other countries for academic, working, or religious purposes. It is because people learn the host countries' culture as soon as they start planning to visit them. Media manipulates, pressurizes, persuades, and influences individuals into thinking that they have to look a certain way in order to be accepted in society.
Background
Today's society is characterized by changing attitudes, beliefs, values, and events. The dynamic nature of society requires that people are kept updated on what is happening within their environment and even beyond them. Human beings need these updates to keep them aware, adaptable, and flexible in the constantly changing global community. Without these updates, a person may lag and fail to adapt to changes that are vital for survival. Media is a unique tool that is currently being used to deliver and obtain information concerning the current affairs, latest fashion designs, gadgets, and styles available in the market.
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Organizations, countries, and businesses use celebrities for advertising their products or services to customers. These famous people may influence the perception of some individuals concerning their body image. Companies have adopted this strategy to advertise products, and this move is believed to be the common cause of mental health illnesses among youths. The rise in the use of celebrities in promoting commodities causes adoption of new behaviors, practices, and body shapes among individuals watching these programs. Media is considered as the mirror of society. The community uses media to reflect on events that occurred in the past, present times and to predict what is expected in the future. Institutions use media as a platform to teach individuals about past events, how they affected groups of people, and the lessons learned from their experiences ( Oakes, 2019) . The lesson and experiences can be used to shape peoples' behaviors and attitudes to make them suit in society. Therefore, media acts as a scrutinizer or watchdog of society regulating the conduct of people in the community.
Effects of Social Media
With the increasing occurrence of invention and innovative skills, people have utilized scientific researchers, skills, abilities, and talents to popularize themselves. Some social media users admire these celebrities. Admirers may want to dress, walk, talk, eat, or interact with other people like these celebrities who seem to be their role models. Therefore, social media has affected our understanding on the concept of beauty and perception of our physical appearance in terms of height, skin color, hairstyle, mode of dressing, body weight, and shape among aspects (Franchina & Coco, 2018). Media influences how we think about ourselves both negatively and positively. Therefore, it is better if we understand the impacts of media on human’s mental and physical health.
Various studies have shown that social media platforms have beneficial effects on the cognitive processes in a human being. However, the demerits of social media on people's perceptions concerning their body image outdo its benefits. People compare their bodies to images they see or with people they interact with on different media forums ( Oakes, 2019) . When these comparisons are made, sometimes they contribute to the maladaptation where individuals comparing themselves feel bad about the shape of their body. Individuals perceive their body images to be undesirable in the society and adopt behaviors which they believe will lead to acquisition of desirable shapes, weights, or body sizes. For instance, when an individual has the perception that being overweight is a sign of imperfect shape, they will adopt mechanisms that restore shapes or sizes they perceive to be perfect in the society (Marikar, 2019). Some communities link some body shapes, sizes and physical conditions to cultural or religious beliefs and practices. For example, some cultures and some religious groups associate physically handicapped children in families with curses, witchcrafts, or supernatural powers. Whenever such beliefs exist, they alter how people perceive other people or their own body images. The media's role is to create a clear understanding of how to avoid such alteration using a culturally sensitive approaches.
Some media platforms are misleading and may alter the way one thinks about themselves. Individuals experience some uncomfortable feelings about themselves. The effects of perceived poor body image can be experienced in the form of general physical health and mental health. Alteration of body image under the influence of media most often affects teens and adolescents ( Radwan et al., 2019) . Teenage girls form the major proportion of the victims, although boys and other age groups may be affected too. Teenage and adolescent girls compare themselves with their colleagues they see on social media where some may feel like they are overweight or obese. The result is avoidant feeding behaviors such as self-imposed fasting (Goodyear & Armour, 2019). On the other hand, when boys compare themselves with wrestlers, football players, they see themselves as weak elements since they have a feeling of having fewer muscles, commonly referred to as 'the six-packs.' This perception makes teenage boys eat excess food or undertake extreme exercises to hypertrophy their muscles. Teenage boys end up being over-nourished or obese, a condition that predisposes them to multiple lifestyle diseases.
Perception of the body image is both a mental experience and an emotional process. An individual creates a mental picture that he or she has an undesirable body image and evokes different feelings, especially when they look at themselves in the mirror. Unhealthy perception of body image means intolerance to or dislike of your body size, shape, or weight. People with unhealthy body perceptions adopt unhealthy behaviors such as eating disorders. Eating disorders refer to a group of psychological syndromes that occur as a result of an altered thought process which evokes maladaptive perceptions of the body images (Goodyear & Armour, 2019). They include bulimia nervosa which is characterized by episodes of secretive excessive eating followed by inappropriate methods of weight control such as self-induced vomiting, abuse of laxatives, diuretics or excess exercise (Rodgers et al., 2018). Anorexia nervosa is another psychological syndrome that is characterized by markedly reduced appetite or food evasiveness. Anorexia nervosa begins with dieting to lose weight. Finally, the psychological alteration goes out of control; without management, the condition may lead to death. With eating disorders, individuals are most likely to have deficiencies or excess of one or more essential elements in the body. Such components are necessary for immune functions, body building and repair and provision of energy (Goodyear & Armour, 2019). With deficiencies of these minerals, individuals become susceptible to diseases, extremely wasted are lack adequate energy to perform activities of daily living.
Self-esteem and body image influence one another directly. When the perceived body image is altered, the affected individual acquires low self-esteem. With low self-esteem, the individual avoids participating in activities that involve unfamiliar people. As a result, such individuals experience difficulties in socializing, initiating relationships and participating in group activities; these individuals feel extremely shy (Marikar, 2019). Such people experience difficulties in learning due to reduced attention span and ability to comprehend. As a result, they have poor academic performances.
On the positive note, there are a number of ways in which media can positively affect our body image. Health and wellness programs can be good inspirational models for social media users. When people who are modelled from the social have healthy behaviors such eating healthy food i.e. balanced diets, containing few calories, more vitamins, essential elements and proteins, users modelling such characters can maintain a healthy and a positive outlook of their bodies. Research show that women are the most affected gender by media and tend to have altered body image than men. Some media platforms tend to benefit women, the landscape of positivity on the internet has increased understanding and the inclusive space for variable body types (Marikar, 2019). The end result is the improvement in the perception of body image when advocacy is made using media.
Healthy perceptions on body image can be improved if individuals, groups and media work together as a team. Media groups should create policies that advocate for improving perceptions of human beings concerning their body image. Media platforms should be used by communities and support groups to disseminate information that target on improving self-esteem of people. The program can be achieved when the media creates avenues for susceptible individuals to build one another through participation. Support groups should be supported or created for people who experience distortions of body images. These groups should be equipped with peer counselor who have experience on altered mental functions through media. These groups will help the victims avoid extremes of psychological disturbances. Participation and support groups give the victims a sense of belonging which contributes to the accepting of their condition and body shapes. Victims must be cared for by professionals trained and equipped with cognitive behavioral therapy skills to provide counseling basing on the assessment of client's individual needs. Professionals must also conduct researches so that they provide evidence based intervention. The community should be educated so that the society itself acquires the maximum capacity to support individuals and families. The community should be educated so that the stigmatization of victims is minimized and an enabling environment created where every individual in the community is regarded as unique and perfect in their own way.
References
Fardouly, J., & Vartanian, L. R. (2016). Social media and body image concerns: Current research and future directions. Current Opinion in Psychology , 9 , 1-5.
Franchina, V., & Coco, G. L. (2018). The influence of social media use on body image concerns. International Journal of Psychoanalysis and Education , 10 (1), 5-14.
Goodyear, V. A., & Armour, K. M. (2019). Young people, social media and health (p. 232). Taylor & Francis.
Marikar, S. (2019). You won’t find your self-worth on Instagram. The New York Times Company. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/02/opinion/sunday/instagram-social-media.html
Oakes, K. (2019). The complicated truth about social media and body image. BBC . https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20190311-how-social-media-affects-body-image
Radwan, H., Hasan, H. A., Ismat, H., Hakim, H., Khalid, H., Al-Fityani, L. ... & Ayman, A. (2019). Body mass index perception, body image dissatisfaction and their relations with weight-related behaviors among university students. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health , 16 (9), 1541.
Rodgers, R. F., Donovan, E., Cousineau, T., Yates, K., McGowan, K., Cook, E. ... & Franko, D. L. (2018). BodiMojo: Efficacy of a mobile-based intervention in improving body image and self-compassion among adolescents. Journal of Youth and Adolescence , 47 (7), 1363-1372.
